Manny Pacquiao isn’t quite as explosive as he used to be. But that doesn’t mean he’s become a less complete fighter, or one that is less dangerous in 2015 to Floyd Mayweather’s reign atop pound-for-pound rankings.
{Image from Chris Hyde/Getty Images.}
No, Pacquiao’s best chance to defeat Mayweather is right now.
Skeptics will tell you that it’s not true. They’ll point to the destructive version of Pacquiao who ran roughshod over naturally larger opponents from 2008-2011, fighters such as Oscar De La Hoya, Ricky Hatton and Miguel Cotto.
Pacquiao was a force in 2009.
They’ll argue Pacquiao’s impressive one-punch power, the type that laid waste to Hatton in the blink of an eye, is gone forever, never to return. They’ll tell you that the power itself was laid waste by the nefarious onslaught of old age.
Gone too, they’ll probably add, is Pacquiao’s otherworldly speed. They’ll admit that he’s still supremely fast, just not blindingly so.
These well-meaning critics of the 2015 version of Pacquiao aren’t altogether wrong. At age 36, Pac-Man isn’t quite the supreme physical specimen he once was. He is not in his physical prime.
If one is to only examine factors like how fast and how powerful a man is to determine his fighting prime, then surely the 2010 version of Pacquiao would be the top candidate for such an honor.
That Pacquiao, the one that came oh-so-close to meeting Mayweather in a proposed March 2010 superfight, had just come off of his most fantastic performance ever, a one-sided, 12th-round stoppage of Cotto.
That Pacquiao had separated the lineal champion at 140 pounds, Hatton, from both his championship and his senses two fights prior in just two rounds.
That Pacquiao had made De La Hoya look like a rank amateur just three fights before, and had sent the Golden Boy to his stool after eight brutal rounds of pummeling him, never to return to the life of a prizefighter again.
But here’s something that’s lost in all the hubbub about how great a destructive force Pacquiao was back then. The very quality that made him such an obliterator of famed fighting men could very well have also been his undoing against the premier counterpuncher in boxing at that time, Mayweather, a man who was also in his physical, and perhaps even fighting, prime.
Pacquiao’s lesson on just how risky unbridled aggression can be to a fighter came in 2012.
After appearing a bit lackluster in wins over Shane Mosley and Juan Manuel Marquez, and after being on the wrong side of one of the more egregious robberies in boxing history against Timothy Bradley, Pacquiao met Marquez for the fourth time in his career in December 2012.
This version of Pacquiao appeared anything but lackluster. This was classic Pac-Man, the one whose mission was to seek and destroy whoever stood in front of him. This was the fighter fans had seen ruthlessly dismantle De La Hoya, Hatton and Cotto. He was just as fast, just as powerful and just as reckless.
Pacquiao appeared to be on his way to a win over Marquez in the fourth fight.
This was vintage Pacquiao.
Even though Marquez’s power had suddenly reached superlative heights, and even though Pacquiao was knocked down by a glancing blow he partially blocked in Round 3, Pacquiao seemed to be on his way to annihilating Marquez the very same way he had done so to other great fighters just a few years prior.
Pacquiao knocked Marquez down in Round 5 and was going in for the kill at the end of Round 6 when the bloodied and bruised Marquez delivered the perfect counterargument to Pacquiao having his best shot against Mayweather in 2010.
With one punch, Marquez demonstrated that Pacquiao would probably have been too aggressive for his own good against Mayweather had the two met before this night. Marquez knocked Pacquiao out cold with one wonderfully delivered right-hand blow as Pacquiao hurled himself forward. Mayweather might have done the same.
It was a tough lesson, but an important one.
Marquez landed the perfect punch in Round 6 to score the KO.
If Mayweather did not exist, it is Marquez who would be considered the best counterpuncher of the era. That isn’t to say the men fight in the same style. They do not. But both rely on landing punches on their opponents as the other man tries to mount an offense of his own.
And both men are exceptional at it.
The version of Pacquiao who rose from the ashes of the sixth-round knockout is not the same man he was then. He is not the hyper-aggressive barbarian out for blood no matter what the cost.
Instead, Pacquiao has wisely adopted a less aggressive, but more effective approach of mitigating risk with his feet and relying on his still-excellent hand speed and punching power to carry the day.
Pacquiao’s last three fights are evidence of a changed man. Yes, Pacquiao is still aggressive and a tremendous offensive fighting machine.
Pacquiao is a smarter, better fighter now.
But against the two fighters with punching power he had to respect, Brandon Rios and Timothy Bradley (in the 2014 rematch), Pacquiao consistently made a point to step away from his opponents throughout the fights so as not to get caught by a powerful counterpunch.
Even against Chris Algieri, Pacquiao coasted to the decision win after realizing somewhere among the six knockdowns of his opponent that he could rattle Algieri’s bones at will. But why give Algieri the only chance he had of pulling out the win by giving him opportunities to land a bout-altering counterpunch?
Pacquiao is a smarter fighter now. He won’t rush into Mayweather’s offense foolhardily. He won’t leave himself open to counterpunches that he’ll never see coming. He’ll keep the fight right where it should be, at the proper distance, where Pacquiao can let his hand speed, power and volume punching carry the rounds for him.
Pacquiao still may not defeat Mayweather. He’s naturally smaller than his opponent and the ringside judges are used to awarding Mayweather wins at the MGM Grand in his adopted hometown of Las Vegas.
But Pacquiao has a better shot at a victory in 2015 than at perhaps any other time during his career. If timing truly is everything in life, Pacquiao is right where he needs to be heading into the biggest fight of his career.
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